Kingdom of Askael
Askael. A broken land. Legends speak of a once mighty empire, stretching across the surface of the planet from the great oceans of the south, hemmed by towering mountains to both east and west, and in the far north, by ice - great fields of snow and jagged ice as far as the eye could see. As the stories go, a great foe rose out of the north, and the empire proved powerless to stop them. Through infighting and the vast distances between the capital and the frontier, the armies arrived too late, and the northern reaches of the kingdom were overrun. In the wake of this tragedy, as refugees streamed south, the empire fell deeper and deeper into chaos. Until a singular event ended everything: the shattering. Legends tell of the very earth cracking, ripping, and flying apart, irrevocably dividing the empire and killing thousands in the process. Askael, a minor trade hub surrounded by farmlands, found itself floating, alone, on a small island lost in a sea of air. Generations have passed, and Askael has lived on well past the memories of its founding, except the faintest traces that still linger in ancient stories and folk tales. The city’s ancient, limestone walls are now crumbling, the pale rock ground under the heels of time’s passage, but the people endure. Farmers make up the majority of society, with a few traders and craftsmen still residing in Askael itself, doing their best to maintain the city with the technology that still exists today. Even the city’s defenses, once a noble brotherhood of knights known as the Knights of the Flame, are greatly diminished, with only a few true knights and their griffon mounts heading the city guard. What few wizards there are do their best to heal wounds, grow the crops, and prevent foul weather. All in all, it is an isolated, small kingdom, struggling to do more than survive in the shadows of ancient glory. Geography, climate, and environment The mistral, a northerly wind that brings cold air that sweeps across the surface of the island. Though it normally lowers the temperature of the island to a pleasant degree in the summer and a rather miserable one in the winter, it tends to keep the skies clear of anything more than a brief rain. While this doesn't prevent the fields from receiving enough water, (and in fact makes storms more powerful when they do occur), any storms are brief, and a cool, temperate sunniness soon returns to the land. Originally, many farmhouses and similar buildings were built with southerly facing doors; while this is no longer always the case, it remains true for rural buildings, as well as any official government building. Virtue 「MISTRAL WIND」 * The mistral increases weather effects (up to double) but reduces their duration (down to half). This applies both to good and bad weather. * When the weather is calm, Askaelic provinces get a +4 to development actions. History See: History of the Kingdom of Askael Established trade with the BlackWind during turn 2. Askael, Kingdom of